(Newser)
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Friday was a big day for bird lovers: Twenty-three new papers revealed all kinds of scientific information about the animals, ranging from how they learn to sing to how they got their feathers, Australia's ABC reports. Among the reports was one looking into how the creatures lost their teeth. Experts know from the bird ancestor Archaeopteryx that the animals once had teeth. But it's been a longstanding scientific mystery whether several different ancestors of today's birds separately stopped growing teeth—or whether a single ancestor common to all birds was behind the dental disappearance.

Turns out that the latter theory was correct, the study says: Some 116 million years ago, a common ancestor to today's birds lost its teeth, ABC notes. Researchers reached their conclusions by investigating 48 different bird species, representing nearly all orders of today's bird family tree, LiveScience reports. All these species had the same mutations in six genes related to tooth development, pointing to the common-ancestor theory. Those "inactivating mutations" suggest "that the outer enamel covering of teeth was lost around 116 million years ago," a researcher says. (A mere 90 million years ago, toothless "dragons" soared through the air.)

The folly of the scientific evolutionary theory, is that it doesn’t have to be scientific based at all.. Very Un Evolutionary things can creativity be explained by happenstance or chance. So Bird evolved teeth to evolve to lose them… Evolving forward and backward at the sometime.. No wonder why evolution seem NO MORE scientific that creation.. Evolution and it followers displays traits of religion.

shebby777

Dec 14, 2014 9:32 PM CST

Barney became extinct rather suddenly because he tried using a rock while peeking into and attempting to bang out an abscessed tooth from between the half-closed beaks of his giant pet pterodactyl. Hell! That's worth another government grant, ain't it?

finkster

Dec 13, 2014 4:21 PM CST

This is the kind of study scientist can sink their teeth into. Pretty smart move on the birds part eliminating dental expenses.